Our Precious Moments

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Society needs science, and scientists need an informed, thoughtful, and open-minded citizenry. [2] This is however not possible without the exhibition of solid scientific communication skills. Assuming that our audience has the full capacity to absorb what is presented to them, the only limitation would then be the scientific researcher's ability to translate his or her ideas across efficiently. With this in mind, we would like to consider some of the communication needs of the scientific research sector.

Firstly, writing scientific reports is one aspect of the communication needs in the scientific research field. Many tertiary students in NUS should be familiar with the numerous lab reports that are required in the various modules. Indeed, scouring through the academic requirements of various sciences and engineering degrees of tertiary institutions, it is not hard to realize that scientific reports form an integral portion of one's module grade.

In addition, the writing of research proposals and grant applications are also crucial skills that a lot of scientists have expressed interest in a research done by the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO). [3] The abovementioned scientific writing skills are also in demand after tertiary studies as shown by the similar job requirement for scientific-related positions advertised online. [4]

Other than the component of scientific writing, there is also the emphasis on the aspect of scientific presentation skills as mentioned by our interviewee, Prof. Helmer. This is another important part of scientific research where the speaker presents his or her ideas directly to an audience. In the tertiary institution setting, students across the faculties are often expected to give oral and visual presentations together with the submission of their scientific manuscripts.

Outside school, the requirement of good presentation skills can also be often seen on advertisement for careers in the scientific field. All in all, scientific communication needs to be underpinned by training and evaluation and they would be best served in the area where the needs originated- the school.

Problem Statement:

The inability to write scientific papers effectively remains a problem for many college students. To identify pedagogical constructs that help undergraduates write well in scientific formats, Jerde and Taper evaluated the effect of the number and type of college composition courses previously taken, science writing experience, and tutorial services and found that the only significant factor influencing scientific writing performance was prior scientific writing experience. [5] This suggests that more emphasis should be placed on scientific writing within the undergraduate science curriculum.

According to our interviewee, Prof. Helmer, there are insufficient opportunities for NUS students to hone their scientific writing skills. Hence, the purpose of this study is to determine the feasibility of extending relevant scientific writing modules from the science faculty to all other relevant faculties with similar needs. In addition, this will also lead to the prospect of initiating a compulsory scientific writing module for all the science and engineering freshmen in addition to the current curriculum of the NUS FOS and FOE.

Friday, December 4, 2009

It's has been well maybe a few years since anything was even posted on this page...many things have happened and so that the many things that didn't happen...Hz has started working and maybe that's why this blog post stagnated...

She is currently a civil person, i mean servant, working for the glory of our motherland. On the other hand, bz is still mugging his head in some local university in Singapore. Oh, did I mentioned that he has just finished his last paper for this semester...that's why he is blogging...like duh...oh ya and bz is also trying to look for a job...it's not exactly that easy even with the improving economic outlook, no thanks to his major/specialization. Well, maybe Quando Quando Quando...(he just went to partyworld...and plus the overnight mahjong session and the evils, he si still not in his best sober state when posting this post...Brilliant...posting a post.)

oh, it's christmas soon and then Year 2010 will come...Happy early New Year! (very early indeed)... (as you can see...bz is malfunctioning today and he seems to talking to himself lots in this post...ridiculous...now where did that came from?)